Showhouse Rooms in Neutral Palettes

Soothing and refined, netural rooms make a statement

Slide 1 Of Showhouse Rooms in Neutral Palettes

Emily Followill

Atlanta Symphony Showhouse
Atlanta, Georgia

If Cheryl Womack and her daughter, Alison Womack-Jowers, slotted the master suite they designed into a color wheel, it would hover delicately on pale neutrals, never sliding into the spectrum’s deep, vivid tones.

Although dressed mainly in ethereal hues, the room has flashes of citron to spark its refined spirit. “There has to be some color in a room,” says Womack. “It’s all about balance and distribution.”

The grand architecture of the suite includes large windows on two walls, allowing streams of sunlight. Linen drapery panels patterned with gray embroidery hang from rods high above the tops of the windows, exaggerating their height.

An array of crisp white and yellow bed linens make little noise, leaving an upholstered bench in citron-colored velvet at the end of the bed as a call for attention. Tucked in one corner are an antique chest and a mirror made to look old. Next to an armchair, a ceramic garden seat is unexpected, adding glossy texture and complementing the neutral scheme.

A graceful seating area is arranged in front of a window framed by linen panels with beaded trim. A chenille-covered chaise longue topped with a Greek key-patterned pillow is served by two tables: an airy acrylic tiered piece and a weightier mahogany side table illuminated by a Murano lamp from the 1950s in the room’s signature yellow accent hue.

Designer Gerri Wiley had the best intentions. The views of the garden outside the sunroom she was designing were so captivating, it seemed unfair to steal nature’s thunder. But in her effort to give the room quiet chic—with sophisticated fabric, a smoky-gray palette, and tailored furniture—she created a room so beguiling that it entices guests to stay inside.

Positioned against the wall under a landscape oil painting that melts into the background, a 19th-century Syrian wedding chest displays dazzling mother- of-pearl inlays.

Even before Wiley added furniture and accents, the sunroom’s long stretches of windows made it an appealing place to be.

She enhanced the setting by tinting the walls a warm, gentle dove gray and choosing a taupe sisal rug with a contrasting Moroccan motif stitched into its ground. Lacy stripes of flowers dance from end to end on the ceiling, leaving no surface ignored. The room is lit by a crystal chandelier in the shape of an oversized tulip.

“When I established the neutral color scheme, I knew that each piece needed to be well-thought-out, unique, and able to stand on its own, since there was no color to highlight it,” explains the designer.

The politely reserved seating arrangement includes a sofa with simple lines in luxurious gray velvet and a pair of graceful armchairs with white linen on their fronts and embroidered cotton on their backs. Tufting and contrasting gray piping add exquisite details. A tufted ottoman, also in white linen, marries the seating pieces.

As he created this guest room, designer Matthew Patrick Smyth imagined a jet-setter enjoying the soft color scheme and restrained decor that would encourage relaxation.

“I would love for this room to be somewhere waiting for me in another city—a city like London or Paris,” says Smyth, “or in a private home as a retreat where one might go in the afternoon to read.”

Inspired by fence grating he once saw on a trip to Dublin, world-traveler Smyth drew a plan for the room’s custom sisal rug in a gray-and-beige quatrefoil pattern. The handsome rug sets the palette for the room.

Against the wall is an iron-and-brass Empire daybed with a regal corona that has been part of Smyth’s personal collection since he moved to New York. The panels flowing from the corona are fashioned from two fabrics—a glazed linen also used on the room’s Roman shades and upholstered walls and a gray linen used as its lining. The pleated corona is embellished with nailheads and a silk trim.

With little architecture in the room, Smyth devised a scheme to make the ceilings, wallpapered in pale green, seem higher, thus more in keeping with the dramatic height of the corona above the bed. Framing each window are custom wood panels that Smyth designed and had fabricated and decoratively painted.

On the opposite side of the room, an ottoman can be pulled out from under a console table for extra seating.